The Irish Goodbye: Micro-Memoirs

What can we learn from an ordinary life observed with extraordinary skill? In The Irish Goodbye, Beth Ann Fennelly writes of the often–overlooked moments that shape a life, whether moving or perplexing or troubling or gladdening.

These micro–memoirs—some as short as a sentence, some longer in form–dignify the diminutive through the act of attention. Fennelly explores her roles as a friend, wife, mother, and daughter, documenting a brush with an old flame or the devastating death of her sister in crystalline, precise sentences.

Full of unexpected wit, The Irish Goodbye is a record of the interstitial interactions—encounters with strangers, quirky observations, unexpected flights of fancy—that make up a richly lived life. With keen insight and nimble prose, Fennelly invites readers to share her affirming worldview—one in which even our smallest interactions are rife with possibility.